Though we have sparred, wrestled and raged, I can tell you I love him each day

[whateverthemess]

Someone's been avoiding the Conrad a little since her last journal entry. Just now, Ruvin's standing outside of a pet store. There are ferrets in one of the windows, piled on top of each other and fast asleep. The people on the street are starting to give her funny looks, but she still can't stop crying.

Cy found a pile of clothes out on the pier

Comments

[with_coffee]

A vengeance angel, even one that's medicated, has all the time in the world to go on long searches through the city for one specific individual. After her response to his journal entry, he needed to find Ruvin. Fast. He was... worried to put it lightly. His searches failed him. Okay, so maybe it's hard to focus. Maybe the city is too big. The reason's don't matter.

Rosie needed a new collar and leash. Robin just happens to step out of the pet store with a bag in hand when Ruvin is standing outside of it. He sees her, opens his mouth to say something, and then follows her gaze to the... ferrets.

Right. This keeps making more and more sense in the way that it absolutely does not. There's that concern burning so faintly at the back of his chest that it's hardly noticeable.

He blinks, eyebrows furrow together. Sentences. He can remember what he was- Something rude probably. Wait, you care about her. Remember? Stop internal monologing and act like it. Try to feel. There it is. See? Easy as pie. Like commanding emotions.

"...Ruvin?"

[changingtheodds]

"...offend me?" This expression says 'does not compute'. She scrubs a sleeve across her eyes, the motion childish and somehow out of place. "No, just--it's complicated."

She's crying because of the Doctor. Because the Doctor is a ferret. No, she can't see that explanation helping this situation at all.

[with_coffee]

Here, Ruvin, have an awkward Robin standing next to you. Not knowing what to say. He's feeling very much like the medication is impairing his ability to think, but not to feel, because this is all awkward and uncomfortable.

"Complicated how?"

It's what he finally manages to ask after scooting closer to her and staring at the ferrets in an attempt to see if he can figure out what it is about them that's making her cry. There may be glaring involved. Because ferrets will totally respond to that.

[changingtheodds]

"The... Doctor. Turned into a ferret." Ruvin rubs her arms and gulps around the knot in her throat. "It's one of the only things I really remember."

She gravitates toward Robin almost unconsciously, the panic of distance like a little burr in the back of her chest.

[with_coffee]

"Oh." ...and now he feels like an idiot for saying the bit about ferrets offending her earlier, but really. How was he to know?

Robin glances sideways at her, noticing how much closer she's gotten to him. He would really like to kill the Doctor, but he doesn't think that will make Ruvin feel better. He would really like to help, but he can't do anything. Nothing new.

He slips his arm around her and pulls her close. Robin closes his eyes. Keep it steady. Focus on the drug-induced haze so the pain of this doesn't show on your face. "I don't feel guilty. For leaving."

Robin swallows. It feels like his head exploded in pain.

"Please. Can you try to be the same for me? I don't want to make you feel guilty for anything. I don't want to-" lose you, too.

He's lost broken girls before. One. The one then. It almost destroyed him. He won't survive another. Not that that's important, but Ruvin's meant for great things. Not to be so thoroughly destroyed by the world.

[changingtheodds]

It feels good to be held. She relaxes into it, wonders briefly why she never let anyone do this before--just hold her, be close to her. Tula hugged her sometimes, but even as close as they were, physical contact--public, private, whatever--between two women--

Proper. Always so proper. She's been so stupid up until now. Is there any way to really change that?

"I love you," she whispers. It almost makes her break down again to say it, to know without a doubt that, even if she can't quite know why, she does know she loves him. Ruvin closes her eyes and puts an arm around him. "Thank you," she whispers. "I love you."

[with_coffee]

Robin doesn't understand what she's thanking him for, but those words hurt as much as they feel good to hear. I love you. He doesn't understand why that that sentence makes his heart feel like its drowning in his chest, surrounding it with intense pressure. His brain isn't processing anything at the speed it should. It's probably better that way, because it lets him say what he means instead of what's safe, and it keeps him from freaking out.

He squeezes her when she says it, again.

"I love you, too," he says. His voice is quiet. He rests his chin on top of her head, protectively.

It won't be until later that he remembers. The last (and only other) time he told someone he loved them... she convinced a young angel to put a bullet through her head a few days later.

Love is never quite enough.